The Student Room Group

Are medical student really cliquey?

When (if!) I go to medical school, I don't want all my friends to be medical students, I would go crazy! I've specifically applied to medical schools where you can mix with other students as part of a bigger university (unlike st. georges for example). I really hate it when people are really cliquey and, no offence to current med students, but I can imagine that med students could be quite cliquey. Are they?
Reply 1
Generally I would say yes, and it makes a certain amount of sense to be. Most of your friends doing standard 3 year courses may be long gone while you are in your final two years - who will you live with, socialise with etc?

The course at Manchester is PBL which makes it pretty easy to make course friends. I sent more time socialising with them than I did my hall friends.

Saying that, I don't actually live with any other medics, or even people from my old hall. All of my housemates are people I met through playing sport...
Reply 2
I guess that depends on whether 270 odd people is a clique...
Reply 3
In short - yes.

Edit: Realised that wasn't very helpful so here goes.

Med is quite demanding, both academically and socially too. By nature, medics are sociable people and most make an effort to come out and support the union/ MedSoc/ UoL etc. Soooo, if the majority of your mates arn't medics, half the events won't be relavent to them i.e dress up as doctors day and other such malarky.

Also, even though we are sociable, the bottom line is that medicine is tough. You do need to do some work at some point and its probably not a good idea to go out and get s*** faced every night (not if you want any chance of passing anyway). You Bsc mates won't understand why you won't/ can't come out with them. Possibly resulting in resentment and them going out without you.

Not saying you can't have non medic mates. I have plenty. But my close ones are medics or dentists. Thats just the way its worked out (cos my halls is full of them :rolleyes: ) Also, the above isn't true for everyone. There's always the oddball amoungst the 350 medics who manages to survive 5 years without making a single "course friend" :biggrin:
Reply 4
There is sometimes a medic clique... and it sometimes *really* annoys me. Sometimes medics spend so much time with each other, in their own clubs and societies, that they don't realise what proper universty life is like. Medicine is hard... but so is Biochem and physics etc.

Also, just because medics are around for 5 years and other people are only around for three years isn't a reason only to hang around with medics. Quite a lot of people do masters, spend a year abroad or in industry etc. So there's always loads of people about.

In short, it's nice to have a mixture - medic mates to hang around at medic stuff and others, so your life isn't "medicine medicine, medicine".

I enjoy medicine and can't wait to be a doctor, but when I am I still want to have interests outside that. Becasue I'm involved with lots outside medicine I can prob do that.

Obviously this is just my opinion, and some people may like spending their whole life with other medics - personally it'd drive me CRAZY!!!
Reply 5
Most of my friends at Uni are medics, but not all. In the first year most of my friends were non medics in halls, we still keep in touch via MSN but don't really see each other around Uni cos the Medical school is on it's own like quite alot are, and medics also spend quite abit of time up at the Hospital too. At home non of my friends that I'm still in touch with are medics.
(3rd year point of view)
I think its so much easier to become better friends with medics because you will see them more, because of the high amount of contact time. We have lots of different tutorial groups and things at bristol, so this means we get to meet a lot of different medic people. And we walk to lectures together etc, so you tend to know more medics. That doesn't go to say you wont know other people, I know many other people from other courses, flatmates everyone in my halls etc. But its just the way it is, your always gonna make your friends on your course, no matter what course!
Reply 7
wednesburywench
your always gonna make your friends on your course, no matter what course!


Exactly. With about 5 hours of timetable a day it's hard to not make friends on your course. Other subjects have 9 hours a week, I can occasionally have 9 hours for breakfast.
I've made a range of friends at uni... everybody turns up in the same situation of "oh hell, I have no friends"... but I came to medschool with my best friend from sixth form, so we just went round fresher's week shaking hands and introducing ourselves.
4 months on, more than half of our friends are medics, but a lot are non-medics (mainly neighbours, flat mates, and their friends). Medics tend to have loads of socials... Ncl has MedSoc every friday, where you turn up and get free beer, and during September/October they had loads of events designed to get you to mix with medics and make friends... it's nigh on impossible to get through 4-6 years of medschool without mates to support you along the way, especially in exam periods and towards the end of your course.
Saying that, there are people I live near who I will head-nod to around the accomodation, but never look twice at on nights out. I walked into the union with a medic friend yesterday and ended up playing 3 games of pool and drinking (multiple) pints with a couple of other medics whose names we didn't even know until now. Medics are more friendly!
corkskrew
Medics are more friendly!


agreed....that is so true, just been down to our hall bar, and the medics are always the ones to say heya hows your day without you asking them first. Medics are simply the best lol
Reply 9
Unfortunately all my friends are medics but that it really due to the fact that I didn't live on campus in the first year and so most of the people that I have met are medics. I am hopeing to join a few societies this term to meet people on other courses. Having said that I have a great group of medic friends and I don't think I am missing out by not having medic friends to be honest. I know a few non medics through my boyfriend who does history as sussex but that is about it.